Thumb Through One at the Check-Out....Yikes!

"Hallway make-out sessions: Dos and Don'ts" .
"How to let him know you're interested."
"How to look hot, even if you feel you're not."
"How to be IN and not OUT"

A recent issue of a popular teen magazine advocated ways to "flirt your way to a date". Another? Turning up one's personal heat (whatever that means) . A featured beauty tip? "Making lips look like they "want to be kissed", of course including a page and a half of advertising for lipsticks, liners and glosses. The marketing demographic? 12-16 year old girls.

Dawn Currie, in an issue of Daughters magazine shares that if your daughter is typical, she'll be drawn to teen magazines. Their allure begins at about age 10 and can last until 16. During these years, she may feel passionately about traditional titles like seventeen and newer reads like Cosmo Girl. Whether or not you like these magazines, they're an unavoidable part of the adolescent landscape. And researchers have found that girls don't have to buy teen magazines to read them - they're everywhere. As parents, we must decide how to respond. Should you worry if your daugther avidly reads teen magazines?

Currie continues, "if you read Seventeen when you were young, you're in for a surprise." The editors of many teen magazines now treat adolescent girls like adults. Annemarie Iverson, former editor of the now defunct YM, was typical. She held a cookie klatch with teens every Friday, and told the New York Times, "Their lives parallel mine. They are so stressed out." Meanwhile, CosmoGirl's editor wants her magazine to tell girls 'everything we finally learned at 25 that we wished we'd known when we were 15." Even the new magazine Mary-Kate and Ashley, written for girls 10 and older, aims to "treat girls like smart women."

These editors argue that girl readers face grown-up problems, and therefore need the information they offer. Indeed, it's true that our daughters must make decisions about sexual activity, drug use, and drinking several years before we did. Teen magazines alone don't create that reality, but they do offer girls standards and expectations - ways of deciding what's normal.

Unfortunately, analyzing teen magazines' content reveals that "normal" means looking good, having a boyfriend, consuming goods, and high school as an endless popularity contest. The diverse identities and concerns of real girls are scarcely addressed, and messages like "be yourself" and "do what's good for you" are overwhelmed by basic beauty-and-boyfriend assumptions. These magazines have very little to say to girls about the value of academic achievement, community service or setting goals for the future. It's fair to say the brain is not the "hot" organ at the center of teen magazines content.

This narrow view does not address our daughter's whole self. Studies show girls are going to read the magazines. The question is, how to open up discussion and use the publications to help your teen identify marketing techniques and limited content.

*Point out the narrow content. It's normal for adolescent girls to want to fit in with their peers. With that in mind, try not to prohibit or attack teen magazines. Instead, discuss with your girl the limitations of their content, which is not nearly rich enough to reflect her life, interests, and potential.
*All girls are different. Research shows that girls who already have a poor self-image are more vulnerable to teen magazines. If this describes your daughter, talk with her directly about the underlying messages in these magazines. And if she's reading Seventeen or Cosmo Girl at 13, ask her to substitute one of the magazines listed below.
*Stress competence over appearance. A resilient girl feels competent. Help your daughter find things she does well, especially activities that lie outside traditional definitions of femininity. Promote sports, one of the fine arts or leadership and service . Activities like these give girls a deep and abiding sense of self.

Nancy Gruver (who is the founder of New Moon, the magazine for girls and their dreams AND the executive director of the amazing non profit called Dads and Daughters) , has put together some great tips for managing teen targeted magazines.
She suggests:

1. Decide ahead of time at what age you will allow her to read which magazines. Try to avoid censorship, which makes the magazines "forbidden fruit" she reads in secret-where you can’t discuss their content with her.

2. Read her magazines yourself so you can converse casually (don't lecture!) about them.

3. Look critically at the magazines as an adult. Do they objectify females or reduce them to body parts? Ask your teen, "how would you feel if it was your daughter in those photographs? Do your magazines make you judge your own body? Do they make you crave certain clothes, makeup, cars and products?"

4. Ask your daughter to identify her favorite article and ad in each issue. Listen for her underlying emotional need and think about other ways you can help her meet that need. Is she concerned about her body? Is she worried about fitting in or getting male attention? When you provide positive attention for ALL of who she is, she’ll have less desire for "appearance-only" attention from others.

5. Ask her what she thinks is real and unreal in each issue. Are the celebrity photographs altered? Do the models look like girls or women she knows? Does the magazine address everything teen girls are thinking of?

6. Tap your own family history for women of accomplishment and influence. Developing a sense of family heritage can feed pride in her ancestors who look like her and did wonderful, important things.

7. Ask her what effect she thinks an article or ad is trying to have on readers. Express your opinions (after listening to hers) about the articles and ads.

8. Provide her with alternatives magazines (see below) even if she does not ask for them. It’s like stocking the kitchen with healthy snacks, even if she begs only for chips and soda. Take old magazines and cut out images and words with her to create articles and ads with respectful, nurturing messages. Compare them to the usual fare.

Most important, keep the communication lines open and trust that as she matures and gains self-confidence, with your support, she’ll find shallow magazines less interesting and will turn toward more challenging and thought provoking pursuits.

Check out these alternatives to traditional teen magazines
American Girl celebrates girlhood and total self. Ages 8-12 http://www.americangirl.com/
New Moon Girl Strong on Total Girl Message ages 8-14 http://www.newmoon.org/
Dream/Girls Interested in Self-expression and the arts ages 9-15 http://www.dgarts.com/
Teen Voices Writing and Literature ages 14-22 http://www.teenvoices.com/


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